March 28, 1863: The city of Los Angeles is selling 2,000 acres “within the eastern boundary of the city” at a minimum price of 50 cents an acre ($9.19 USD 2012).

The Los Angeles Star visits the new waterworks and describes its construction.

The project consists of a dam 395 feet long “formed by a double row of 24-foot piles driven 18 feet into the ground.”

“From the reservoir formed by this dam the water will be lifted to a height of 40 feet by a wheel revolving by the action of a current formed by a flow of water from the dam.”

“The water thus elevated is delivered on the north bank of the river and will be received in a covered ditch, one foot by two in size, and conveyed to a point near the Catholic burying ground, a distance of about one-half of a mile, where it is proposed to build a reservoir and from whence citizens will be furnished with water through the medium of pipes.”

Mrs. Jane Swisshelm seems to want to exterminate all the Native Americans in Minnesota.

2 Responses to Land Bargain in L.A.: 50 Cents an Acre!

Building a reservoir near the “catholic burying ground” could have contaminated the water, and was a bad public heatlh move. The Bronte sisters probably died due to groundwater contamination by a nearby cemetery. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronte_family